If you want to just see what went into making Quintessential Earth, this is my process:
NOTE: Quintessential Earth will be introduced with the Studio Practice on 10/15/2023. But if you insist, I’ll see if the photographer is available. Thank you.
If you want to do instinctive art by rote and don’t mind going in sightless, without a plan of any kind, you can follow along on my process below. You’ll need: a sense of adventure, a piece of blank paper, colors green, two blue, two browns (one reddish), two muted yellows, purple, several grays, black, and silver, a pencil to sketch in and an eraser to sketch out, and a thought. Or any colors you choose.
● Start with a quote from somebody you admire. I chose Hannah Arendt who said “The earth is the very quintessence of the human condition.” My thoughts went to how we’re changing the planet by our presence and about a report on how astronauts’ bodies are changed by being in space for extended periods. See https://abcnews.go.com/Health/1-year-space-body-nasa-astronaut-frank-rubio/story?id=103406478 or many other reports online.
● Look at the blank piece of paper and wonder what to do with it.
● Locate a nice green pen. Make random marks. Think of the wondrous array of plants on our planet.
● Stop making marks before the whole page is filled. Think of what might need to be introduced next.
● Oooh! Yes, water. Find a skinny blue pen and make meandering lines all over.
● We have a water planet. Fill most of the edges with a different blue color margin. (Assume the skinny blue lines suggest pipes, drains, etc. Maybe creeks.)
● Remember to include desert and mountains: sketch in a yellow area for desert up top because it looks nice there, a jagged grayish lump for mountain ranges at the bottom.
● Enhance desert and mountains with a light brown for the desert outline and light gray for sooty snow on the mountain tops.
● We make a lot of buildings. Cut a stencil for a repeat silhouette. Place on paper at will. Maybe place in parallel for simplicity.
● Use a skinny brown pen to outline the building’s silhouettes because I’m not sure how this is going to fit in with the whole.
● Notice there are all kinds of green marks and skinny blue lines within the building outlines. That’s probably okay because buildings have been planted on top of so much.
● Enhance the buildings idea. Add brown skinny lines to differentiate between buildings.
● Do we need all those window additions? No. We can’t see out and that would’ve been tedious and would add repetition of pattern we don’t need.
● The skinny blue lines between the building silhouettes are not emphasized enough. Do something. Add more blue marks; suggest running water. Be careful to not go inside the buildings.
● But we do need doors on the buildings. Gotta get in and out, right?
● Add more lines and colors to the mountain range.
● Add conspicuous doorknobs in little black circles.
● What about other life forms!!!
● Create eggish-ovals and spread them around the composition. Not any in the desert or mountains though. The desert is too subtle and the mountains too complicated by now.
● The buildings are getting lost. Outline the tops with a broad, darker reddish-brown.
● Add brown splotches under the green marks to suggest soil. Be careful not to go inside the buildings.
● What about marine life?!
● Okay. Add some vague fish-like silver marks in the ocean.
● Decide it’s time to stop making marks.
NOTE: Quintessential Earth will be introduced with the Studio Practice on 10/15/2023. But if you insist, I’ll see if the photographer is available. Thank you.
If you want to do instinctive art by rote and don’t mind going in sightless, without a plan of any kind, you can follow along on my process below. You’ll need: a sense of adventure, a piece of blank paper, colors green, two blue, two browns (one reddish), two muted yellows, purple, several grays, black, and silver, a pencil to sketch in and an eraser to sketch out, and a thought. Or any colors you choose.
● Start with a quote from somebody you admire. I chose Hannah Arendt who said “The earth is the very quintessence of the human condition.” My thoughts went to how we’re changing the planet by our presence and about a report on how astronauts’ bodies are changed by being in space for extended periods. See https://abcnews.go.com/Health/1-year-space-body-nasa-astronaut-frank-rubio/story?id=103406478 or many other reports online.
● Look at the blank piece of paper and wonder what to do with it.
● Locate a nice green pen. Make random marks. Think of the wondrous array of plants on our planet.
● Stop making marks before the whole page is filled. Think of what might need to be introduced next.
● Oooh! Yes, water. Find a skinny blue pen and make meandering lines all over.
● We have a water planet. Fill most of the edges with a different blue color margin. (Assume the skinny blue lines suggest pipes, drains, etc. Maybe creeks.)
● Remember to include desert and mountains: sketch in a yellow area for desert up top because it looks nice there, a jagged grayish lump for mountain ranges at the bottom.
● Enhance desert and mountains with a light brown for the desert outline and light gray for sooty snow on the mountain tops.
● We make a lot of buildings. Cut a stencil for a repeat silhouette. Place on paper at will. Maybe place in parallel for simplicity.
● Use a skinny brown pen to outline the building’s silhouettes because I’m not sure how this is going to fit in with the whole.
● Notice there are all kinds of green marks and skinny blue lines within the building outlines. That’s probably okay because buildings have been planted on top of so much.
● Enhance the buildings idea. Add brown skinny lines to differentiate between buildings.
● Do we need all those window additions? No. We can’t see out and that would’ve been tedious and would add repetition of pattern we don’t need.
● The skinny blue lines between the building silhouettes are not emphasized enough. Do something. Add more blue marks; suggest running water. Be careful to not go inside the buildings.
● But we do need doors on the buildings. Gotta get in and out, right?
● Add more lines and colors to the mountain range.
● Add conspicuous doorknobs in little black circles.
● What about other life forms!!!
● Create eggish-ovals and spread them around the composition. Not any in the desert or mountains though. The desert is too subtle and the mountains too complicated by now.
● The buildings are getting lost. Outline the tops with a broad, darker reddish-brown.
● Add brown splotches under the green marks to suggest soil. Be careful not to go inside the buildings.
● What about marine life?!
● Okay. Add some vague fish-like silver marks in the ocean.
● Decide it’s time to stop making marks.